Accessability

Crimson Dynamics for FE

Crimson’s extensive experience of and presence within the higher and further education sectors has enabled the development of a range of education Accelerators which deliver sector-specific functionality “out-of-the-box” for most operational areas of an institution where CRM has applicability. Fine tuning of Accelerator functionality to suit each individual customer’s operational requirements is delivered by the Crimson Fusion implementation methodology.

…commercial business management with an FE bias…

Business Development -

In their business engagement activities colleges are not materially different from commercial organisations who market products/services to a target customer base and as a result, generic CRM system functionality provides a reasonable fit with these processes. However, there are a range of specifics within FE which need to be catered for. Business Development teams engage with employers to recruit work-based learners onto vocational courses as well as striving to create and fulfil apprenticeship vacancies from their pool of potential candidates. The ability to provide an Impact Analysis of services delivered helps to encourage additional business from existing customers.
This Accelerator builds on the standard commercial functionality of Microsoft Dynamics by providing a range of customisations and processes which extend and enhance CRM to address the specific commercial practices found within the FE sector.

…recruiting candidates for employer vacancies…

Vacancy Management -

Typically in support of apprentice training, there is a requirement to record employer vacancies, profile candidates, identify suitable matches and help fill the vacancy via a formal recruitment process. None of this is provided by generic CRM functionality and this Accelerator delivers the essential vacancy and candidate records along with the additional data and processes required to support the whole cycle from vacancy creation to fulfilment. It is thus ideal for apprenticeship recruitment, but also works for traineeships and work placements at relevant employers that need to be provided for all full-time learning programmes.

…supports the student journey from enquiry to enrolment…

Student Recruitment -

The term student journey has been in popular use for some time within the sector to describe the lifecycle from initial engagement between college and learner and to the subsequent completion of the chosen course of study. Throughout this whole engagement colleges have identified that a positive customer experience improves the recruitment rates achieved. This Accelerator addresses the pre-enrolment stages of the student journey and delivers functionality not found in core Microsoft Dynamics CRM to support the specific business processes involved with enquiry and application nurturing.

…supports the student journey from enquiry to enrolment…

Schools Liaison -

Colleges who engage with feeder schools as an active part of their student recruitment programme will benefit from the specific functionality provided by this Accelerator. As well as providing a modified organisation record to capture specific data about the school, integration with the EDUBASE database allows detailed school performance data to be imported as required. In order to track the effectiveness of time invested, each school visit conducted can be recorded along with students attending and subsequent enquiries received.

…professional management & delivery of student support requirements…

Student Welfare -

The provision of most support services to students begins post-enrolment and with CRM being used for the marketing and recruitment aspects of the journey it makes entire sense for student welfare staff to use the same learner record to track the various support provided as this further enriches the “single customer record” and enhances the quality of engagement possible. The Student Welfare Accelerator provides rich functionality to manage and support the wide range of student services provided by most colleges using a full suite of customer service features including case management, knowledge management and resource scheduling to manage student appointments with the various support staff.

This Accelerator also addresses the specific requirements associated with disabled students and the staff who are involved in providing the additional support required. This begins with identification at enquiry stage and is based on the provision of a specific disabled student record which supplements the standard student data with that additionally needed to manage and support the disability requirements.

…fosters ongoing engagement and re-recruitment of completed learners…

Alumni -

Whereas much of student CRM functionality is focused on the student journey up to enrolment, this Accelerator focuses specifically on completed learners and the nurturing of this group to promote awareness of relating learning and to foster their continuing professional development with the college. This might range from the simple membership of the alumni community to active involvement in recruitment events, all of which can be achieved with this Accelerator. The rich customer record of previous learning and outcomes built up within CRM allows the specific targeting of completing learners enabling highly relevant marketing communications to be made.

Event Management -

Open Days are a key part of the marketing mix for most colleges and this Accelerator provides customised extensions to the standard Marketing module to improve event planning, publication and promotion along with delegate, exhibitor and sponsor management. With event management fully integrated with learner records, the ability to target market relevant student cohorts will increase open day registrations and improve enquiry conversion. It also greatly simplifies the provision of joining instructions, attendance tracking and feedback analysis. For each event, a full financial analysis of costs and viability can be produced.

…target your segmented customer groupings with relevant messages…

Marketing Communications -

For most colleges student recruitment begins with effective marketing, involving the targeting of prospective learners and businesses with relevant study/training options based on their customer profile. This is a business application well served by core Microsoft Dynamics CRM as marketing capability is integrated with detailed customer records. This core capability can be further enhanced by partner applications such as Dotmailer or Microsoft Dynamics Marketing, both of which provide rich text email marketing and click-through analysis of email communications sent.

Additional communication channels can be opened up by the addition of the Crimson Social Media and SMS Accelerators, which can be particularly useful for younger learners.

…24x7 on-line self-service capability from your website…

Website Integration -

Customer self-service enhances the engagement experience with the college and this can be achieved with an interactive website integrated directly with relevant aspects of CRM. This is particularly appropriate for enquiry submission, service requests & follow-up and open day promotion & registration. The Crimson Portal Accelerator delivers a technical framework within which the specific settings can be configured to facilitate website to CRM integration.

…target your customer using appropriate communication channels…

Social Media & SMS Integration -

Using the most appropriate communication medium can be just as important as the message itself and these two Accelerators enable connectivity directly between CRM and social media feeds and text messaging providers. Outgoing messages are created within CRM and delivered by the selected medium. Additional Activity records track these against each customer record along with incoming responses if desired.

…enrich the CRM record with customer data from other business systems…

Systems Integration -

It is quite common for some customer data residing in other business systems to benefit from integration with CRM. In education this is typically the case with the student management system and Crimson has successfully achieved this with all the leading suppliers. The Crimson Integration Connector provides a technical framework within which the precise integration settings can be configured to enable this automated process to take place.

Please Note: We have placed cookies on your computer to help make this website better, please read our Privacy Policy for further information.
You can change your cookie settings in your browser at any time. Otherwise, we'll assume you're OK with our use of cookies.